Case Studies:

Case Study: Social Collaboration

Company profile: Deltek, Inc.

Headquartered in Herndon, Virginia, with over 1,600 employees worldwide, Deltek is the leading global provider of enterprise software and information solutions for professional services firms and government contractors. For decades, Deltek has delivered actionable insight that empowers their customers to unlock their business potential.

Business Situation

Deltek, a major player in accounting and CRM packages for professional services firms and government contractors, wanted to explore the Internet space with online collaboration software. Taking task management to the next level of collaboration across a user’s business and personal life promised to evolve a more efficient, agile, and successful organizations. Researching current competitors, Deltek realized they had a business solution not identified by any existing software site on the Internet.

Technical Situation

Transitioning away from a legacy of very large (heavy) systems developed mostly in a waterfall methodology, including Java/JEE and C#/.Net architectures, Deltek wanted something new and innovative. Deltek sought a company to help them build the next pervasive collaboration internet platform – a virtual equivalent of an open office environment for an organization.

Solution

Based on their reputation for delivering high quality, innovative results, Deltek came to Solution Street to help identify the architecture for this new and innovative product called Kona™. Ruby on Rails, a Javascript framework, and a real-time notification component serve as the base of the architecture. Solution Street managed the team initially using Agile Methodology and, working hand-in-hand with the Deltek staff, created a fully functional and very popular site – www.kona.com - with both web and mobile

Benefits

By using the Agile Methodology and the architecture set up by Solution Street, Kona is able to adapt to new and changing requirements quickly with production builds released every three weeks. Features not found in any competitor differentiate the website.

Technologies, Products and Services Used

Running on the EC2 servers on Linux operating systems, Kona uses Ruby on Rails technology with a MySQL database. Kona leverages Javascript MVC, AngularJS, and OAuth2 integration with external sites such as Google, Yahoo, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Solution Street works together with the Deltek IT staff on design, development, test, deployment and support for a platform now boosting Deltek client’s productivity with the power of social collaboration.